The present invention broadly relates to project management and scheduling software and, more particularly relates to a tool or application program for visualizing the progress of industrial project schedules, and deviations in the schedules as expected in accordance with progress data inputs, e.g., slippage.
Project management may be described loosely as the planning, organizing and managing of resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project goals and objectives, e.g., industrial projects. A project may be defined broadly as a finite endeavour having specific start and completion dates and undertaken to create a unique product or service to bring about a beneficial change or added value.
The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all of the project goals and objectives while honouring the project constraints. Typical constraints are scope, time, resources and budget. The secondary challenge of project management is to optimize the allocation and integration of inputs necessary to meet pre-defined project objectives. As a discipline, Project Management developed from different fields of application including construction, engineering and Defense. In the US, the two forefathers of project management are Henry Gantt, known for seminal planning, control techniques and the Gantt chart as a project management tool, and Henry Fayol, known for the identification and characterization of project management as six (6) management functions.
Project management software is a term covering many types of software for use in project management. Project management software may include project scheduling functions, project cost control functions, project budget management functions, project resource allocation functions, collaboration and communication functions, project quality management and documentation tools, etc.
Tasks or activities of project management software include scheduling events and series of events required to implement a project, e.g., a turnaround. Some common scheduling challenges include: a) events which depend on one another, i.e., interdependencies; b) scheduling people to work on, and resources required by various tasks, i.e., resource scheduling; c) uncertainties in duration estimations of each task comprising a project; d) arranging tasks to meet hard and soft deadlines affecting project profitability; and e) juggling multiple projects simultaneously to meet profitability, without limitation. Scheduling complexity varies considerably depending on the project management software or tool used.
In many complex project management schedules, there is a “critical path,” or series of tasks/events that depend on each other and determine the length of the whole project. Effective project planning software highlights these tasks, or critical paths, which are often good candidates for any optimization efforts, and provide large amounts of pertinent information to various persons involved in a project. Typical requirements for an effective project planning tool might include an ability to a) generate efficient task lists for people assigned to the project, b) generate allocation schedules for project resources; c) present overviews highlighting expected task lengths; d) identify early warning of any risks to the project; e) present information on workload; f) present evidence of progress, without limitation.
Project management software can be implemented as tools that run on a desktop computer or as web-based applications where data processing occurs at a server location accessed by local computers through an intranet or extranet (i.e., via a web browser). Microsoft, Inc. has developed and makes available a tool identified as Microsoft Project™ Primavera, Inc., now owned by Oracle Corporation has developed and makes available Primavera P3 Project Planner, and Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management Tool.
Primavera's project management tools are used for scheduling and tracking time and cost of labor, materials and equipment usage in different project events comprising a complete project plan. Such project management tools support project managers and support staff at their tasks of responding to the complexity of large projects, for example, project controls in the petroleum, chemical and power industries. Slippage of project activities is updated daily, weekly, etc., depending on project constraints, resulting in the adjustment of time as represented in Gantt charts or bars, developed by Henry Gantt, as mentioned. A “Gantt chart” is a type of bar chart that illustrates a project management schedule by way of start and finish dates of the terminal and summary elements. Terminal elements and summary elements comprise the work breakdown structure of the project.
Gantt charts, however, do not represent the size of a project or the relative size of work elements, therefore the magnitude of a behind-schedule condition is easily miscommunicated. For example, if two projects are the same number of days behind schedule, the larger project has a larger impact on resource utilization, yet the Gantt does not represent this difference. Because the horizontal bars of a Gantt chart have a fixed height, they can misrepresent the time-phased workload (resource requirements) of a project. Moreover, complicated Gantt charts or other known visual devices used to represent project critical paths are known to lack detail.
Conventional project management and planning tools construct a database that identifies every piece of equipment by some type of identifier (equipment) and code, and activities which might be executed on the equipment. The tools may even provide a user with lists, or Gantt charts relating to equipment and/or structure, for example, in order to manage a large power or petroleum plant shutdown. Conventional schedule management tools, however, are not known to provide schedule views that include the equipment and indicators to convey status of the actual progress as compared to expected progress in the scheduled timeline. That is, while conventional project management schedule software may list equipment and structural elements, and CAD tools are known to depict a project layouts that include such equipment and structure, conventional tools are not known to provide views readily communicate an expected and actual project schedule, and deviations between actual schedule status and an expected schedule.